“The Wyndham Werewolf” is a collection of intriguing
bedtime tales from the mysterious Fallacious Rose, an excellent author, as it
turns out, with a great tongue and use of grammar – the book is copy-edited to
perfection.

The short stories, downbeat and downplayed, yet strangely
entrancing, are told in a soft yet menacing style.Although not so on the surface, there is a
sense of common theme running through them, though this may simply be the tone
underlying them all.Set in a small
Australian outback community, some focus on wild things that creep in the night,
while others turn their attention to mortality, giving them a feeling of claustrophobia,
and much more substantial than a small slice of melancholy - yet, despite the
unspoken despair beneath the monologue, the sheer quality of Rose’s writing style
wraps the reader in a big, cosy hug; this is the kind of book you want to read
on a rainy night in front of a crackling log fire.

Despite its title, “The Wyndham Werewolf” doesn’t even
really hint at horror, so much as perhaps one or two of the tales whispering about
it in the distance – I like that: the genre ambiguity is interesting and
welcome, leaving the reader to use a lot of their imagination; some of the
recurring references are tantalizingly tenuous.

I tried to pick a favourite, but if I’m honest I liked
most of them equally, though “A Hole in the Ground” gave me a nice little smile
at the end, while the craftsmanship of “Skeleton in the Closet” is undeniable.

For ease of reading, it would have been nice to see a
linked table of contents in the e-book. But otherwise, this was a very enjoyable book –
so enjoyable, in fact, the only disappointment was that at just 85 pages it
left me wanting to read a lot more, and wishing it was twice the length; I will
certainly be taking a look at Rose’s work in the future.